W E have for some time past felt the need of a place in the 
magazine for a more intimate form of expression than is 
possible in the articles and departmental notes. In these we can 
but direct toward the magazine’s readers the stream of informa¬ 
tion, suggestion and, perhaps, inspiration that has its source in 
the minds of the leaders and pioneers in home making and gar¬ 
den craft. In view of the fact that a man looks to House & 
Garden for specific instructions as to when to set out bulbs, how 
severely to prune raspberry bushes or what to do against the at¬ 
tacks of the curculio, the articles and notes, necessarily, have been 
for tbe most part of a decidedly practical nature. In our hunger 
for planting information or suggestions upon the choice of hang¬ 
ings we are apt to lose sight of the broader side of home making 
— “we cannot see the forest for the trees.” With the idea that a 
step back for a more comprehensive view of the subject as a 
whole cannot fail to be productive of good, we have set aside this 
page. In it we shall try to find space for an intimate discussion 
of some of the many interesting phases of home making in 
America. 
THE PROMISE OF AMERICAN ARCHITECTURE 
N OTHING could be more suitable as an opening subject 
than the encouraging prospect, everywhere apparent, of 
American architecture and interior decoration. Look back, if you 
will, but ten years, and recall the almost hopeless depths into 
which our national taste had sunk. Picture the stuffy, un¬ 
comfortable, depressing “parlor” of that day, with its lathe- 
product furniture, its sprawling design of gilt encrusted wall pa¬ 
per, its gaudily colored carpet, its hideous array of mantel orna¬ 
ments and its rococo gilt picture frames that waged incessant 
warfare with their blatant background. Surely the picture is not 
overdrawn. Compare it with the home of today in country or 
suburbs. Could any prospect be more encouraging than this tre¬ 
mendous step forward ? 
OUR DEBT TO ARCHITECTS 
T HERE have been many forces at work assisting in this 
renaissance — the material prosperity of the nation, the in¬ 
creased facility of travel abroad and the advance of our educa¬ 
tional standards among them, but it seems to us that especial 
credit is due the architects of the past two generations in America. 
Early and late they have labored for better things in American 
art, usually in the face of a lamentable but nevertheless firmly 
established tradition, ignorance, and a national taste that was at 
its lowest ebb. To these men wiio, by reason of tbeir education 
and reinvigorated taste, strove always for better things, greater 
credit must be given by reason of the fact that they chose not the 
easier path in their work. It is always easier to make a living by 
giving a man just what he wants in the shape of a house rather 
than to impress upon him the desirability of spending his money 
for something that as yet he is unable to appreciate. Yet, on the 
whole, that more difficult course is the one the architect has in 
recent years chosen, and is chosing today. 
AN INTERESTING EVOLUTION IN FURNITURE 
T HE betterment along the lines of interior decoration has fol¬ 
lowed the lead of our architecture and, particularly in the 
last four or five years, has made rapid strides towards the high 
levels that have been set in certain epochs of the past, when the 
pendulum of artistic appreciation had swung to a high point of 
the arc. It is particularly interesting, and perhaps instructive as 
well, to glance back over the more or less distinct stages by 
which we have reached the point we now hold. As might natu¬ 
rally have been expected, the increasing efficiency of wood-work¬ 
ing machinery led the generation or two before us into a veritable 
riot of turned forms, machine-pressed “carving” and jig-saw de¬ 
tail that had absolutely no excuse for being, excepting that it 
showed how marvelously versatile our machinery had become. 
Satiated to the point of rebellion with this sort of thing, it was 
once more the perfectly natural thing for the public to face about 
and seek relief in the products of hand craftsmanship—the furni¬ 
ture that proclaimed, vociferously at times, by exposed tenon 
and pin, neat mortising and the absence of all curved lines, carv¬ 
ing and other forms of ornament, its escape from the thraldom of 
the machine. Though better than what had gone just before, the 
unnecessary weight and clumsiness of this so-called Misssion fur¬ 
niture — and with it came obtrusively coarse hand-woven hang¬ 
ings and ornament founded on geometrical forms rather than on 
plant life—soon became wearisome. A gradual process of light¬ 
ening and greater refinement soon began to make itself felt, the 
beauty of the curved line was again recognized and finally a 
feeling after suitable and restrained ornament has started to de¬ 
velop. Of course there have been other tendencies apparent in 
this evolution — our recognition of the beauty of wood and line in 
the furniture and architectural detail of our Colonial ancestors, 
the influence of the art nouveau that stirred Germany into an 
artistic revolution, and our increased familiarity with the spirit 
and letter of historic styles that have gone through their marked 
cycles of revolt, refinement, decadence and revolt again in France 
and England. An unprejudiced survey of the road over which 
we have come in the past decade, however, cannot but be encour¬ 
aging. We have been sifting out the chaff and, in the main, have 
refrained from straying into side paths that would have led only 
to disaster. 
The progress in furniture is but an index of the advance made 
in the past decade in other branches of interior decoration. Look, 
for instance, at the wealth of varied design and texture in the 
fabrics now obtainable for hangings or for furniture coverings— 
and these not alone in the more costly forms. Indeed, in the 
case of fabrics, excellence in design seems to be found, as it should 
be elsewhere, nearly as frequently among the inexpensive stuffs 
as in those of greater cost. Look, also, at our modern American 
pottery, the increasing use of simple brass receptacles, the pre¬ 
vailing higher standards in floor coverings, the notable improve¬ 
ment in wall-paper design — particularly along the line of restraint 
and better color. Is not all this a most pleasing prospect? 
AN AWAKENING TO THE JOYS OF GARDENING 
UR progress in gardening during the past decade has not 
been so marked as in architecture and interior decoration. 
Or perhaps it would be more nearly accurate to say that the 
advance, while as sure, has not been so apparent because of the 
fact that America as a nation has not yet reached a point where it 
is as much a national instinct to make a beautiful garden as it is 
to make a beautiful home. There is no need to reproach ourselves 
with this fact—just as there is no need to reproach a child because 
he can walk but cannot talk. We simply have not arrived at the 
gardening age, nationally. In England, as we all know, even the 
most humble laborer has his dooryard garden — he would as soon 
think of dispensing with it as with his cup of tea. The day when 
we, too, will have reached that stage is not yet in sight, but it is 
coming. 
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